Might want to look at the history of Lend-Lease as well as the previous "cash-and-carry" policy of the USA from 1940.

You might also note that the USA took part in escorting convoys full or war material to the UK and USSR before Pearl Harbor.

And google Reuben James sometime (hint: Halloween 1941 was BEFORE Pearl Harbor).

As to the point you thought you were making, noone declared war on us, and we weren't wrapped up in mutual defense pacts with people like Poland (which is what got the UK involved inn WW2), so why should we have gotten involved earlier? Because you can't beat the Germans alone is not, in and of itself, a reason for us to help you (though, as mentioned above, we did help you, just not by throwing bodies at your problem).

Then, he up and smacks her, and starts hitting his kids. And then does it again. People yell at him from around the restaurant, but noone does anything else, and he smacks her again.

So, do I/we have a responsibility to stop the guy?

Well currently it looks like he's been hitting his wife and kids for quite some time, and nobody did intervene. But just right now, he has poured some unidentified liquid in the soup that the family has ordered, and *that* you consider over the top, because in your moral sense, it is fundamentally wrong to poison the very food that your family eats.

The restaurant's chef (his name is UN) passing by your table is still cautious because haven't seen yet if the man has actually *peed* in the soup, or just emptied a tap water bottle, and tries to calm you down.

But nonetheless you decide that the whole "probably peed on" soup incident was over the top, so you ready yourself to grab that grenade that you always carry in your bag for this purpose an throw it on the guy. In order to blow him up into pieces. While at risk that the grenade will tear the wife and kids into pieces too. And will probably hurt a few other tables around. (Not mentioning that the whole restaurant is going to become a place where everybody else is going to feel a little bit less comfortable). You see a friend called france on a neighbouring table who promise to put "likes" on the facebook photo album you plan to do about the incident. It's good because the few other friend you had around (including the big guy called Britain) are telling they are fed up with your facebook photo album boasting.

Meanwhile the man is still hitting his wife and kids. (Oh, did I mention that the wife is a member of some weird religious sect who encourage her to ritually bite of the genitals of all individual including her own kids ?)

While all this is happening, there have been fights around quite a few other table (like the one where the family is named Rwanda) but nobody actually cares. And by fight I mean that not only have the man started hitting his own wife and kids, but also move pn to stabbing them with all the available cutlery on the table and is trying to see if he can use something as a make-shift whip. But at least, thank god *he* didn't try peeing in the soup.(You notice that you happen to be the owner of the shop selling the cutlery and make a mental notice to sell him a few more pieces because there's definitely some market for this).

Meanwhile while you were busy noticing all this around you, a friend on your table has discretely stolen your organiser and is methodically copying all the phone numbers of your mistresses. A waiter passing by notice it a tries to make you realise it. But all you do is start running after him trying to find a way to catch him and waterboard him (but hidden in the kitchen, not on your own table in front of your wife and kids).

A nice blond girl called Sweden is trying to distribute band-aid to all the hurt people.